Rebecca Ryan is the Campaign Director of Defund the BBC.
The BBC was once a cultural titan, at the forefront of the world’s media as the most respected news source around the globe. Many millions tuned in to its radio and TV broadcasts.
That is a distant memory, as so many have turned away from ‘Auntie’.
Where once the BBC was the only show in town, there is now a flourishing arena of choice. From ITV, its traditional rival, to more modern broadcasters such as Sky and online streaming services such as Netflix, there has never been more choice in how you can watch TV.
The wide array of options and the speed at which companies have created new, innovative ways to watch TV, and content has torn away the BBC’s monopoly. Traditional broadcast media is struggling to adapt to the fundamentally different viewing choices of the modern era. They are being rapidly outpaced and outflanked by streaming services.
This year is likely to be the turning point.
Analysts are predicting that 2025 will be when Brits pay more for streaming services than broadcast TV. This is alongside precipitous falls in traditional TV. This is why we at Defund the BBC have launched our report, ‘Outdated, Outpaced and Out of Touch: The Future of the BBC Licence Fee’, to highlight the problems and call for a meaningful conversation about reform.
In 2014, well over 1,000 programmes generated more than six million TV viewers. Nearly ten years later, this number crashed by more than 80 per cent to just over 200 occasions in 2022. Even when reducing the number of viewers, traditional TV is simply not as popular.
For the BBC, though, there are far deeper problems than the contrast between booming streaming services and the plunging numbers of broadcasters. It has staggered from scandal to scandal, refusing to learn its lessons. Stories about safeguarding, equal pay and naked ideological capture are all too common.
It cannot then be a surprise that trust in the BBC’s content has cratered, allegations of bias in the supposedly “apolitical” and “neutral” public service broadcaster are commonplace. In just ten years, the belief that the BBC was a fair news source has halved. According to the latest YouGov tracker, only a quarter of the public think the BBC is “generally neutral”. This is on top of persistent public belief that the BBC is out of touch with British values.
Is it any wonder that the public is rejecting the BBC like never before?
Despite the price of the licence fee going up, it is bringing less money every year. It consistently runs a budget deficit, despite a total income that is more than twice that of ITV, its longest-running domestic rival.
Polling has repeatedly shown that Brits believe that the BBC is bad value for money. They do not support it remaining funded by public money, either through general taxation or the continuation of the licence fee. At the same time, there is majority support for a commercial funding model either through advertisement or subscription.
The status quo must not continue.
After all, why does the BBC not learn from its mistakes or improve its content? Simply put, it does not need to. It has guaranteed funding that is completely disconnected from its ability to draw in viewers.
Meanwhile, the latest government suggestion for reform is hardly confidence-inspiring. Far from recognizing the deep flaws of the licence fee and the BBC, it will once again protect the BBC from its failures. To penalise those who have rejected the BBC by enforcing payment of the licence fee on those who only watch TV through streaming services would be a disgraceful betrayal of the freedom of the British public.
The BBC is a bloated and complacent organisation that is wholly reliant on the safety net of the licence fee. It is an unsustainable relic of a bygone era that is far from the interests of the public. It is time for the doors to be thrown open to competition.
If the BBC is the success its supporters claim it is, what are they afraid of?
Rebecca Ryan is the Campaign Director of Defund the BBC.
The BBC was once a cultural titan, at the forefront of the world’s media as the most respected news source around the globe. Many millions tuned in to its radio and TV broadcasts.
That is a distant memory, as so many have turned away from ‘Auntie’.
Where once the BBC was the only show in town, there is now a flourishing arena of choice. From ITV, its traditional rival, to more modern broadcasters such as Sky and online streaming services such as Netflix, there has never been more choice in how you can watch TV.
The wide array of options and the speed at which companies have created new, innovative ways to watch TV, and content has torn away the BBC’s monopoly. Traditional broadcast media is struggling to adapt to the fundamentally different viewing choices of the modern era. They are being rapidly outpaced and outflanked by streaming services.
This year is likely to be the turning point.
Analysts are predicting that 2025 will be when Brits pay more for streaming services than broadcast TV. This is alongside precipitous falls in traditional TV. This is why we at Defund the BBC have launched our report, ‘Outdated, Outpaced and Out of Touch: The Future of the BBC Licence Fee’, to highlight the problems and call for a meaningful conversation about reform.
In 2014, well over 1,000 programmes generated more than six million TV viewers. Nearly ten years later, this number crashed by more than 80 per cent to just over 200 occasions in 2022. Even when reducing the number of viewers, traditional TV is simply not as popular.
For the BBC, though, there are far deeper problems than the contrast between booming streaming services and the plunging numbers of broadcasters. It has staggered from scandal to scandal, refusing to learn its lessons. Stories about safeguarding, equal pay and naked ideological capture are all too common.
It cannot then be a surprise that trust in the BBC’s content has cratered, allegations of bias in the supposedly “apolitical” and “neutral” public service broadcaster are commonplace. In just ten years, the belief that the BBC was a fair news source has halved. According to the latest YouGov tracker, only a quarter of the public think the BBC is “generally neutral”. This is on top of persistent public belief that the BBC is out of touch with British values.
Is it any wonder that the public is rejecting the BBC like never before?
Despite the price of the licence fee going up, it is bringing less money every year. It consistently runs a budget deficit, despite a total income that is more than twice that of ITV, its longest-running domestic rival.
Polling has repeatedly shown that Brits believe that the BBC is bad value for money. They do not support it remaining funded by public money, either through general taxation or the continuation of the licence fee. At the same time, there is majority support for a commercial funding model either through advertisement or subscription.
The status quo must not continue.
After all, why does the BBC not learn from its mistakes or improve its content? Simply put, it does not need to. It has guaranteed funding that is completely disconnected from its ability to draw in viewers.
Meanwhile, the latest government suggestion for reform is hardly confidence-inspiring. Far from recognizing the deep flaws of the licence fee and the BBC, it will once again protect the BBC from its failures. To penalise those who have rejected the BBC by enforcing payment of the licence fee on those who only watch TV through streaming services would be a disgraceful betrayal of the freedom of the British public.
The BBC is a bloated and complacent organisation that is wholly reliant on the safety net of the licence fee. It is an unsustainable relic of a bygone era that is far from the interests of the public. It is time for the doors to be thrown open to competition.
If the BBC is the success its supporters claim it is, what are they afraid of?